The First Mother's Day
by Tessenchan
Summary: [Oneshot] The first Mother's Day after Margaret's passing, they went out to dinner, just like always. Written for the Motherless Mother's Day challenge.


**A/N**: This is the fastest fic I've ever written (only took like five hours,) so I'm not sure about this. I had a hard time with it. Written for JLM's Motherless Mother's Day challenge on the NUMB3RSorg fanfiction forum. As far as timeline is concerned, I always assumed Margaret died sometime early in 2004. (Alan states it had "almost been a year" since she died, and that was in _Vector_.) This is Mother's Day 2004, so at the least, it's been two or three months since her passing.

Also, please forgive me my lateness with the second chapter of _Disillusioned_; it's going through ever-so-many revisions. But I promise I'm working on it.

**Disclaimer**: Characters you recognize belong to Cheryl Heuton and Nicolas Falacci and CBS and the Scott brothers and-- well, the point is that they don't belong to me.

**The First Mother's Day**

They're going to go out to dinner, same as they always have.

Typically they wouldn't. They don't really have anything to celebrate today, not like other families do, anyway. But Charlie's birthday was the day before, and all three of them had appointments and schedules and work. Today was the one day all of them could manage to get away, and Alan insisted on treating his baby boy.

Today hadn't felt any different when they woke up. Alan made breakfast, Don watched the game, Charlie chattered easily about the multitude of birthday cards he'd received from his female students the day before. Alan teased that Charlie should go after some of them, Don teased that Charlie was somehow physically incapable of such, Charlie babbled math at them in retaliation.

Normal.

The day hadn't even begun to wear before the normalcy faded, and a sharp sense of something lacking tore into them. As they sat to eat, her spot was empty. Three gazes conjoined over the chair where she had sat, three voices cracked as they tried to move seamlessly through conversation over the areas where she might've spoken. It was too soon; too soon to speak of her offhand, even to remember her warmly.

Especially not today.

After finishing their meal, the three men got up to go their separate ways: Charlie darting out to the garage, Don returning to his vigil in front of the television, Alan going to the kitchen to wash dishes. Even as he did, he felt the sinking feeling beginning to rise. Washing dishes was such a mindless task, just the constant soaping and rinsing and setting aside, that soon he could hear her voice as clearly as he could hear anything else, see her hands drying the dishes at his side. What she was saying he couldn't understand, but it was her voice, so simple in tone but so much like balm to his aching soul. He followed up into her face, her beautiful face framed by that mess of wavy hair, only to have his gaze find nothing. Nothing but a blank space of wall. Alan grit his teeth.

The game played on in front of him. The crack of the bat and the roar of the crowd triggered a sense of nostalgia that pulled him so violently back that he could smell the leather of his glove, the freshness of the grass, even the beer and hotdogs in the stands. He could hear the mandatory buzz of so many people speaking at the same time, and yet out of the noise he heard her voice, screaming out his name with such pride. Another crack, and the ball sailed his way; before the runner even rounded first the ball slapped into his glove. Out. He tossed it back to the pitcher, grinning widely and smacking his gum. His eyes traced up into the stands to see her, standing on her feet and cheering him on. When he snapped out of his reverie Don's eyes crinkled as he found himself looking at her picture on the wall.

The board before him was empty. He stared at it, envisioning the numbers dancing across its hard green surface before he'd even written them, looking exactly as he sees them in his mind and yet, failing to come to a point, the point where they make sense. He began to write, hoping that putting them order will incite some sense, some order to the menagerie of expressions and equations. Half-thoughts and ideas poured from him onto the board, and for awhile he was lost, unable to feel her eyes on him as she watched him move and think and seek answers to his many questions. When he finally did realize it, sense her presence, Charlie spun, eyes widening over the empty place by the door.

She wasn't there.

.n.

"I don't want to go out tonight."

Alan straightened his collar, glancing at Charlie through the mirror. The young man stood behind him, looking ill. Not in the physically ill way, either. His voice didn't crack with the pain of a sore throat or a cough, and his eyes didn't burn with fever-glow or sag with fatigue. No, the sickness, Alan suspects, that Charlie was feeling was borne of a broken heart. Couldn't say that he blamed him, but Alan couldn't bear to stand around this huge, empty house anymore today.

"What's the matter, Charlie?"

"I just... don't feel like going anywhere." He leaned against the wall, expression pitiful.

"C'mon, it'll be fun. Get your mind off finals."

"Technically, as the professor my mind should be _on_ finals..."

"What's the hold-up?" Don poked his head into Alan's room, an irritated expression on his face. "We're going to get stuck in traffic if you two dilly-dally around in here much longer, and if I hear one complaint about blowing the whole night in the car, I'm dropping you both off at--" Don paused as he looked over his brother's haggard, chalkdust-veiled clothes. "You are not going to dinner in that, are you?"

"I was just telling Dad: I'm not going." Charlie's head sagged against his shoulder, as if he was so exhausted of pleading this case, he'd used up his physical energy.

"In order for this to be a birthday dinner, the birthday boy has to attend," Don remarked, "Otherwise it's just me and Dad hanging out."

"Makes me so glad to see that you value your time with me," retorted Alan.

"Look," Charlie griped, ignoring his father's retort, "I just don't feel well. Is it going to cause some great time and space paradox if we don't celebrate my birthday one year? I don't think so." With that, the mathematician folded his arms and frowned, clearly satisfied that he'd made his point. Dismissing his complaints entirely, Alan gave Don a nudge as he slipped past him on his way out of the room.

"Get him dressed and in the car in ten minutes, or we'll be late."

Charlie gawped at his father's retreating back, hands held out. "What part of 'I'm not going' did you miss?"

"The part we're you're not going," Don replied, taking Charlie's arm and tugging him out of their father's room, down the hall to his own room. Charlie frowned at him, allowing himself to be led to his room, where he stood by his desk and sulked while Don rifled through his closet. As Don tossed a shirt and a pair of pants onto Charlie's bed, he took those brief moments to examine his brother; Charlie seemed to be dealing with some inner torment, in addition to the pout-frown that had settled into his features, the one Don recognized as Charlie not getting what Charlie wanted. The agent sighed in exasperation, reaching up to scratch at his hair as he headed back out of the room.

"You think this day doesn't suck for me? Or for Dad?" he asked, garnering his brother's attention. For a moment their eyes met, and Don glared at him. "Quit being a selfish brat and come with us."

Charlie's brows furrowed as Don left, not caring to wait for a reply and at the same time, showing Charlie that he would accept nothing less than his attendance.

A few minutes later, Charlie came down the stairs, giving his hair a last-minute run-through. "Alright, let's go."

.n.

Dinner was a disaster. Of epic, biblical proportions. The three Eppes didn't even speak to each other, not out of spite or out of anger, but simply out of fear. What could they possibly talk about? What topic couldn't find its way back to the empty place at their table, couldn't weave its way into a memory of her?

Don was so sick of the silence by the time they were on their way home that he stopped by the 7-Eleven on the corner a block before the house and bought two six-packs of beer. Alan gave him an incredulous stare as the older son reseated himself in the driver's seat. "Donnie, you're not going to--"

"No, I'm not." He handed off one of the packages to Alan, then leaned back and passed off the other to his brother. "Happy birthday."

"Don..."

"If we're not going to talk then we might as well do something," explained Don. "I'm tired of moping."

"Getting drunk isn't necessarily the answer, son."

Don looked up at his father, eyes serious. "I'm not going to get drunk. I just want to feel a little less."

Alan blinked at him, momentarily stunned. From behind them, both heard Charlie's soft voice. "I'll drink to that."

When they arrived back home, they didn't even bothering going into the house. The three of them camped out on the front porch, sitting together in silence at first, drinking their beer and feeling almost like they were obligated to. Don had made the decision for them, as he did often these days, following faithfully his oath to protect them, even from their own wallowing. One-third of the way through his second beer and already working on a pretty nice buzz, Alan broke the silence.

"I saw her today."

The boys looked up at him at the sound of his voice, and Alan looked down at the two pairs of glassy black eyes peering up at him. So much like the inquisitive expressions of their youth. He could see their childhood in them, the features of two little boys sinking slowly into the adult bodies of two young men. It was scary how much like his wife Don looked. Scary how much like his wife Charlie was.

"What do you mean you saw her?" Charlie wondered.

"She was just there. Saw her plain as day. She looked..." He shook his head. "Beautiful. Like she did before she got sick."

"I was thinking about her too," said Don. "Remember when you guys came to see me play... I think it was against Bakersfield. Anyway, Danny ... well, Danny something or another, can't remember his name... He smacked the ball out to me and I snatched it out of the air just as he was coming at me, remember?" The two of them nodded. Don shrugged, looking out over the lawn. "I dunno why, but I remembered that today. Haven't thought about it forever, but I saw it... saw her, just like I was there again."

Charlie looked down, absently staring at the mouth of his beer bottle. He hadn't seen her. _Couldn't see her. Because I left her...?_ Tears welled up unbidden in his eyes and he blinked them away, lifting the bottle to his lips and taking a long drink. He let the bottle down, leaned back against the side of the house and sighed. "I hate this day," he proclaimed.

The two older Eppes looked down at his slouched form, slight and slender, unlike the two of them. In the dark, they could only make out the faintest of features, the starlight shining off of his wet eyes. He seemed so much smaller when he was upset. But then, so did Don, and Alan briefly considered that he too might seem much more vulnerable. He spoke gently. "Son, I know that it's hard right now, but things'll get easier." _Not necessarily better, but easier._

"No, I hated it even when Mom was still here," Charlie told them. "She never seemed happy on Mother's Day."

Alan grimaced, both amused and confused. "Your mom loved Mother's Day. She lived for it. You boys were always making her things. Cards and crafts and stuff. She got such a kick out of it." He looked up at Don, only barely able to see him. "You remember the first time you boys ever made her something together?"

Don's face contorted as he thought back, then he nodded, gaze switching between his brother and his father. "Oh yeah. That picture frame we made out of popsicle sticks? The one you helped us with. I was like... what? Eight?"

"Right," Alan agreed. "You guys painted it yellow, and I used a hairdryer to dry the paint quicker because you two decided to do it the day of."

"Yeah, and I helped you cut out a tulip made of felt," Don reminded Charlie, "Glued it on the side as an accent. Then glued a picture of us together on it."

"Yeah yeah," Alan nodded. "She loved it. She showed it off to everybody at her office."

Charlie shook his head. "That may be, but do you remember what she did when we gave it to her?"

Don caught his breath. "She started crying."

Charlie took another sip of his beer. "She was always crying on Mother's Day."

Alan sighed, shaking his head at Charlie. "Your mother was soft like that," he said reassuringly. "Whenever you boys would make things for her, it just made her so happy. She was a strong woman, but when it came to you boys she had the biggest heart. It wasn't sadness, Charlie, you oughta know that."

He shrugged then, a non-verbal concession of his father's point, and Don looked down at his brother. "What brought that up?" he wondered.

Charlie shook his head, eyes lowered to the porch floorboards, hiding the growing tears in his eyes. "I don't know," he admitted. "I was just wondering... if she was crying now."

**END**


End file.
